On the accession of Aune, while the actual command of the army was left in the hands of Marlborough, Prince George was declared generalissimo of all the queen's forces by sea and land; and he was also made lord high admiral, but with the .novelty of a council to assist or act along with him. The queen also sent a message to the Commons, desiring them to make some suitable provision for her husband iu case he should outlive her; • and it was agreed that he should in that case have an income of 100,000/. Great opposition however was made in the Lords to a clause in the act exempting the prince from being comprehended in an incapacity created by the act settling the succession on the house of Hanover, which had provided that no foreigner, although naturalised, should hold any employment under the crown after that family came to the throue.
The prince's administration of the Admiralty was not glorious. In 1703, in 1704, and again in 1707, the loudest complaints were brought forward in parliament both against the proceedings of the lord high admiral's council and the conduct of affairs at sea. In fact as Marl borough, now a duke, governed the army in his own name, lie governed the navy also through his brother, Admiral George Churchill, who was all along the prince's chief adviser. The prince is said to have sometimes complained of his insignificance or want of influence, but his dissatis faction evaporated in the quietest way. Lord Dartmouth has some curious notices of him in his splenetic notes to Burnet's history. In one place he says :—" Hie behaviour at the revolution showed he could be made a tool of upon occasions, but King William treated him with the utmost contempt.' When Queen Anne came to the throne she
showed him little respect, but expected everybody else should give him more than was his due; but it was soon found out that his inter posing was a prejudice in obtaining favours at court." Dartmouth goes on to state that all foreign princes had him in very low esteem, and he mentions some strange surmises made abroad as to the causes of his want of influence which were certainly altogether imaginary. " After thirty years living In England," this note concludes, "he died of eating and drinking, without any man's thinking himself obliged to him ; but I have been told that he would sometimes do ill offices, though he never did a good one." (Burnet, ' Own Times,' i. 643. Sec also note on ii. 489.) His death took place at Kensington Palace, October 28th, 1708.
His little capacity for business was made still less by his indolence or love of ease, which appears really to have been his strongest pas sion, or the most marked point of his character. Anne bore him no fewer than nineteen children, of whom only five lived to be baptised, and even of these two died on the day on which they were born. A daughter Mary, born Juno 2nd 1695, lived till February 8th 18S7 ; another, Anne Sophia, born May 12th 16913, lived till February 2nd 1687; only a eon, William, born July 24th 1899, and soon after created Duke of Gloucester (though the patent never passed the great seal), and in 1690 elected and Installed a knight of the Garter, outlived his infancy : he died July 30th 1700. He was a boy of great promise, and a copious account of him is given by Burnet, who was his preceptor.